Improved US-Cuban Economic Ties in Doubt when Trump Assumes Presidency

The nascent growth in U.S. business ventures in Cuba is now in doubt, with uncertainty whether U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will carry out his campaign vow to undo President Barack Obama’s diplomatic thaw with the communist island that ended five decades of hostilities between the two countries.

U.S. cruise ships are docking in Havana, American flights are landing in Cuba and U.S. hotels are booking guests. But the death of Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro and the ascent of Trump to the U.S. presidency in two months have left open the question of whether the improved economic links will continue with Cuban President Raul Castro.

Even as Obama renewed diplomatic relations with the island nation 140 kilometers off its southeastern shore and made economic overtures, the U.S. maintained its official trade embargo, which most Republicans who control Congress support keeping in place.
At one point during his lengthy campaign for the White House, Trump said, “All of the concessions Barack Obama has granted the Castro regime were done through executive order, which means the next president can reverse them, and that I will do unless the Castro regime meets our demands.”

Reince Priebus, Trump’s White House chief of staff when he assumes power, echoed that sentiment Sunday, telling Fox News that the president-elect needs to see “movement in the right direction” from the Cuban regime in order to maintain the renewed diplomatic relations.

“Repression, open markets, freedom of religion, political prisoners — these things need to change in order to have open and free relationships,” Priebus said. “There’s going to have to be some movement from Cuba in order to have a relationship with the United States.”